Two thousand years ago, the only people with human rights was a Roman citizen (Civis Romanus). Who decided this? Of course, those who were in power. Gaius, one of the greatest Roman lawyers, distinguished three types of tools that a citizen – a man enjoying all rights – could have: non-moving and non-speaking tools, moving and non-speaking tools (animals), moving and speaking tools (slaves).

One can easily see how arbitrary and unjust that conception of the person was, as it allowed those who were in the position of power to define personhood in a manner extremely discriminatory against those where more vulnerable and, for various reasons, didn’t meet the criteria. If we take a closer look at the modern-day world, we might notice some alarming similarities.

For instance, philosophy professor Peter Singer claims that, although all persons should be respected and protected, not all human beings can be called persons. According to him, a human being before birth is not a person because he or she does not fulfill the criteria of rationality, autonomy, and self-awareness, and therefore does not deserve any legal protection. Who can decide these prerequisites? History is likely to repeat itself: someone in the position of power.

Not only are the preborn deemed not-persons according to Singer’s criteria. In the article After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?, published in the Journal of Medical Ethics, the authors Francesca Minerva and Alberto Giubilini propose the idea that both fetus and newborn are only “potential persons”. Therefore, killing them does not cause any harm, because it does not affect any “real person”. They also reject adoption as an alternative for after-birth abortion, because it could be emotionally difficult for parents (“real persons”).

It must noted that personhood is not a synonym for personality. Someone who had a car accident and lost memory, does not become a different person, even though his personality, understood as behavior and abilities, might be significantly changed.

Defining personhood based on ethnicity would be wrong because it is not equally shared amongst all humans. To define it based on social status, or intelligence, or skills would be wrong for the same reason. Consequently, it is wrong to define personhood based on age, as some would want in the case of the preborn or newborn. This is the view adopted by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which in its preamble speaks about “recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family”, instead of making the distinction between persons and non-persons.

Human rights are grounded in being human (belonging to the human family), not behaving in a certain way or receiving certain status from the external powers. That truth relates to human dignity possessed simply by the virtue of humanity. Providing any other basis for it will have consequences – probably very tragic.

I remember a class discussion with my colleagues when the professor asked the students why we possess human dignity. Honestly, most of us expected rather purely legal questions which could be easily answered with the norms from legal acts. But having a philosophical discussion instead of just memorizing things? For me, that’s always great. However, I was really shocked when my friend said that we have human dignity because our constitution gives it to us. Initially, I thought he meant something else, but later he confirmed his view. When I asked what would happen if human dignity was not in the text of the constitution, I got no response.

We praise rational thinking, non-discrimination, and equality. How it is possible to still believe in granting protection only to those arbitrary deemed “persons” by those who set up their own criteria, speaking from the position of power?